The College Football Playoff picture continues to get clearer across the nation, and that is certainly the case in the SEC.
Oklahoma knocked Tennessee out of the CFP hunt in their elimination game on Saturday night, Georgia remained in the picture by escaping Jacksonville with a win while Texas made a bold leap back into the chase with a statement victory over Vanderbilt.
It’s shaping up to be another year where the SEC’s presence looms large in the bracket, and ESPN’s Heather Dinich believes that four of the league’s programs would qualify for the playoff if it began today.
Dinich currently has Alabama at No. 3 as her highest-ranked SEC team, with undefeated Texas A&M following closely behind at No. 4. She explained that the Crimson Tide’s plethora of ranked wins places them above the Aggies, although she did note that Bama’s lone loss could still come back to haunt it.
“Some committee members could continue to penalize Alabama for its season-opening loss to Florida State, which looks worse each week. Plus, the Aggies haven’t lost and are No. 1 in ESPN’s strength of record metric.”
Meanwhile, Georgia slides in at No. 5 and appears pretty set in that slot based on its head-to-head results within league play.
“The Bulldogs escaped a feisty Florida team in Jacksonville on Saturday to remain one of the committee’s top one-loss contenders. The head-to-head SEC results, though, will keep them sandwiched between Alabama and Ole Miss. Georgia’s only loss was by three points at home to the Tide on Sept. 27, and its best win was on Oct. 18 at home against Ole Miss. An overtime win at Tennessee will also help separate Georgia from other one-loss contenders ranked lower. And for as many questions as there have been about Georgia’s defense, Florida converted just 2 of 11 third downs and was 0-for-2 on fourth down.”
Ole Miss follows the Dawgs at No. 6, with them just edging unbeaten BYU in the rankings according to Dinich. While she applauds the Rebels’ ranked wins, she could see the Cougars being ranked higher based on other metrics.
“BYU is undefeated and entered Week 10 ranked No. 9 in total efficiency; Ole Miss was No. 21. BYU was also No. 5 in strength of record, a slight edge over No. 7 Ole Miss.”
That rounded out the four included SEC teams, but Dinich also ranked Texas and Oklahoma at No. 11 and No. 12, respectively. She believes both programs have great shots at reaching the field, but they would each be bumped out due to automatic qualifiers from the ACC and Group of Five.
The first official College Football Playoff Top 25 will be unveiled at 8 p.m. Tuesday night on ESPN. Here is Dinich’s latest top 12:
- Ohio State
- Indiana
- Alabama
- Texas A&M
- Georgia
- Ole Miss
- BYU
- Oregon
- Texas Tech
- Notre Dame
- Texas (replaced by ACC champion Virginia as No. 11 seed in bracket)
- Oklahoma (replaced by American champion Memphis as No. 12 seed in bracket)
Parker is currently the sports editor for the Enterprise-Journal in McComb, Mississippi. He's a graduate from Mizzou who has experience covering the Tiger football and basketball beats for SB Nation, and he's worked for a variety of sports news outlets in the past.
